Sunday, December 15, 2019

My Frugal Ways this Past Week 12/15/19!

I had such a interesting week with the field trip to the capitol of Michigan, Lansing. It's such a beautiful restored building.  I've been there a few times before but it's been a long time since I've had a guided tour.  It was nice to know some facts that I hadn't heard before, like Michigan's first governor was just 24 years old!  Imagine that. 

The kids were a lot of fun and so smart.  Very well behaved.  




I made bird suet this past week.  I used the leftover lard I had from a new recipe I tried, frying chicken without flour.  It didn't turn out the best but we ate it anyway.  

I reused a large shopping bag for a trash bag,


We bought a ham at Meijer's for 88 cents a pound for Christmas.  I believe they are on sale again this week.  We also bought the grandson a new winter jacket with their santa bucks coupon this past week for 30% off.

I reorganized the pantry.  You wouldn't think that was a frugal thing but now I know that have plenty of chicken soup and I won't need to buy more.  Saves money on groceries!  

I was able to get a free candy bar that JCPenny was handing out with a 30% percent off the total purchase coupon in it. They were already on sale so this made the gifts I was buying very affordable.  As we walked out of the store a church had a table and wrapped the gifts I had bought for free.  Such a nice time and I got my mall walking in that day too.


I forgot last week to say that we went through our local historical village with our car to see the lights.  We all piled in the van and only paid $5.00 to drive through.  It was so pretty and fun.  


My Goals this week:  

Finish wrapping presents (just a few more coming in the mail).

Clean out the spice cupboard and fridge.

Keep walking (the capitol had 91 steps in it so I considered that and one mall walking enough exercise last week)!  

How did you save this past week?  


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10 comments:

Jenny said...

We finished our first bathroom last week.....sort of. Everything is finished except painting & replacing the trim. So we're using it through the holidays. The soaker tub is glorious.

So if you're a praying girl pray about a discrepancy we found in our bill...an $800 discrepancy. :( Ugh! I did not catch it when I paid. All the paperwork is crazy. The lady stands over me talking nonstop as I try to go over things. Plus so much more I won't list here. Anyway we want to get that straightened out before starting on our next bathroom Jan. 1st. Heaven help me I hope we all survive it.

I only ate out once this week. I had a fasting blood draw & went to breakfast afterward so I could run errands before heading back home to work.

Painting....we're saving lots of money doing the painting ourselves. We've been working on it for awhile & did some this week.

I packaged up left-over cookies from a cookie tray I bought for a party & gave them as neighbor gifts. I normally make baked goods myself but my daughter-in-law bakes cookies to sell & made a gorgeous (& delicious) cookie tray for me.

I borrowed my daughter-in-law's air fryer for the weekend to decide if I want one. I've had so many comments from friends that I 'need' one. I like it but have decided I don't want one so that's a good savings.

I received some sweet gifts from friends...two lily bulbs, a new Dayspring purse, a new blouse(bought at a thrift shop brand new with the tags on....I love my thrifting friends!) , a pair of gloves, a bluebird of happiness hand blown glass bird (they make these just a few miles from where I live), a candle & a little Christmas church figurine. I decorate my kitchen with Christmas churches.

I was given about a dozen children's books by my neighbor. She's given me great kid things before & these are such great books! Today's children's books are such a waste of time IMO.

This week...
I am determined to finish painting my bathroom!
Begin emptying the two closets that will go with the next bathroom remodel.

Is that enough? I have my grandson 3 days this week as well. I'm so happy to finally have him back at my house. I had to watch him at my son's house while they were working on it.

Vickie @Vickie's Kitchen and Garden said...

Wow Jenny you have been so busy! It is so much easier for us to babysit at our home too-I feel like I can get things done here as well as play with the kids.
I didn't like my air fryer either -I sold it. I love that you were able to test one out first. Such a great idea.
It takes awhile sometimes to finish a work like you guys are doing. It will all be worth it!
Have a great Sunday!

Chef Owings said...

Vickie Our Amish neighbor fries chicken without flour but said to use vegetable oil and high heat. Hubby has ate it ( I wasn't home) and said he would have at least coated it with corn starch.

Vickie @Vickie's Kitchen and Garden said...

Yes your husband is right, it seemed rather bland without the coating. My husband told me a guy used to coat his in cinnamon where he worked. I guess everyone likes something different.

KayM said...

I'm sorry the chicken recipe wasn't that good. That's always a disappointment. Here's how I did on frugal living this week: o I used a coupon to treat my daughter and myself to lunch at Olive Garden—saved $4.
o I chose not to add chicken to my Fettucine Alfredo saving $3.50. (I was able to eat more free salad and breadsticks—we asked for refills).
o I found some Boost Nutritional Drink for Women marked down to $2 for a 6-pack and I also used a $4-off coupon. I got $34 worth/24 bottles for only $4!
o I took the time to find a WM manager to see if she’d individually price a pair of leggings that had lost its partner—open pack. I got them for $5—not really a discount, but I only had to buy the one pair I wanted, not the missing companion black pair for an additional $5.
o I peeled and individually froze 5 overripe bananas (my granddaughter gave them to me) for protein drinks—free food.
o I’m using up the somewhat flimsy Dollar General bags (the ones they use for the merchandise purchased) instead of using my good trash bags in the kitchen. I’m being careful and not overstuffing them.
o For the two gift items that I needed to buy for needy children, I bought a Columbia jacket for the little girl, but saved money by choosing a different color on Amazon—over $3 saved. I saved 10% on the Nike hoodie I bought for the boy from Dick’s by giving them my email address. I got free shipping on both items.
o I like to send gifts from Harry and David’s for Christmas and other occasions. In October I joined their Celebrations free shipping plan for 1 year for only $20, which was $10 off the normal price and got my money back figuratively speaking, by ordering one gift and sending it to my brother in Alaska, which always costs double on the shipping. So, this week I ordered 4 gifts to go to Alaska and 1 to go to another state—all free shipping. I also saved $62.75 by using special codes that I’d scoped out. I was persistent and called customer service, because one of the orders wasn’t coming out right by ordering online.
o It certainly pays to go over your credit card bill. I found 2 incorrect charges. After two calls to the merchandiser w/o results, I finally called AMEX and they removed 1 overcharge and 1 other charge that I did not make and they refunded the money to my account--$30 worth.
o I also made a pan of brownies from a Ghirardelli mix that was in my pantry--out of date by a few months. It was fine. So, that was what I took to Ladies’ Circle on Sunday afternoon.
All in all, it was a good week.

Anonymous said...

I love the discoveries made when organizing the pantry and freezer. It's like found money!

Vickie @Vickie's Kitchen and Garden said...

It's a lot of surprises for sure. I think I ended up with 10 cans of chicken soup!

Vickie @Vickie's Kitchen and Garden said...

What a deal on the Harry and David's shipping. I didn't know that shipping was double to Alaska. Makes sense though.
I love all the ways you saved money this week!

Anonymous said...

Vickie the lit up Christmas tree is divine and glad you went to see it. You are so right there are so many things you find when you go through your pantry and in our case our food storage room :o that you forgot of made it's way to the back of the shelves that will save you money :).

Plans for this week as we are having 40's degree celcius temperatures will be mainly indoor pursuits but we will finish off the rest of the grocery shopping for a few last minute things we need for Christmas.

Our savings last week added up to $206.23 :).

Here is what we got up to last week -

Finances and listings -
- Listed 10 items on a free eBay listing promotion saving $16.50 in usual listing fees.
- Paid an extra part payment off our home mortgage and we are now 10.3 months ahead in our payments in the first year :).
- Banked more into our 3 month living expenses emergency fund bringing us to 62.3 % of the way there.

In the kitchen -
- Made a homemade cheesecake saving $12.78 over purchasing it.
- Made a double batch of sultana and coconut biscuits saving $14.02 over purchasing them.

Firewood & helping neighbours -
- Cut another 1.2 cubic metres of firewood free from our neighbour's property saving $144 over buying it in. We also cleared a lot of fallen branches around the property and took them to the tip for her.

Purchases -
- Purchased a 4.54 kg leg of ham on special with a $10 off promotion and combined this with a further 5% off with our RACQ Wish Gift card to save $12.17 on usual prices. This brought down the price of the ham to $7.13 kg. We de-boned it and sliced it up and put it in meal sized portions for the freezer.
- Bought on markdowns 3 x 600ml of thickened cream and 1.76 kg of capsicums saving $6.46 on usual prices. We froze the cream and chopped up the capsicums and put them in meal sized portions in the freezer.

In the gardens -
- Planted cucumber, lettuce, basil & capsicum seeds and a rosemary plant in the gardens.

Did our usual with any water we could save from showers, dish rinsing and grey water and used it all to water or clean something with :). Joy of joys we had a little rain which probably put a little back into our rainwater tanks, happy dances :).

Have a wonderful week ahead everyone :).

Sewingcreations15 (Lorna)

Vickie @Vickie's Kitchen and Garden said...

Lorna I heard it was supposed the best will be record breaking for you this week. I'm glad you don't have to do anything outside.
It's amazing how fast your paying down the mortgage.I'm so impressed! You had a lot of great savings this week. Have a great day!